Where’d You Come From?

Lately I’ve been looking back over a lot of the posts on this blog and one thing that’s jumped out at me is the variety of ethnic flavors that pop up, in these comments. Then I started wondering how many of you would care to post about your ethnic background. Where’d you come from, and how’d you get here? Might be interesting.

I’ll start: My forepeople were British. My mother’s family name was Oxford. She always wanted to dig up a connection with the Oxfords of Oxford University but without success, and I doubt any such connection exists. My father used to talk about the Hales being a Duke’s mixture of English-Scotch-Irish. Our branch of Hales sprouted out of a boatload of Brit immigrants answering to that name. They congregated in the state of Virginia, where they were active in various pursuits, one of which caused a significant increase in that state’s population.

How and when my early people got to Texas I have no idea. Maybe, like so many others who came west, they were running from something. Either nobody knows, or they don’t want to talk about it.

102 Responses

France- Normandy area – sometime in the late 1600’s – my original Great Great (not quite sure how many “Greats” ago”) Grandfather was thrown out of France for being a salt theif (well, they strongly suggested he “imigrate” anyway)! SALT!! of all things. I am starting to believe that I am being punished for his “salt theivery” all these decades later since I can’t touch the stuff because of blood pressure problems! Thanks GGGGGG Grandpere!!

That’s great Verna – my ancestors were ran out of France also. Great-great-great…Grandpa played a few costly tricks on the wrong people and then decided to check out America. He and his brothers made their way to Canada working as pirates – I mean porters – on a ship sailing across the Atlantic. Once on North American soil, they traveled south to what is now known as Louisiana. Their sons -one of which was my great grandfather – became a cotton farmer / slave owner. His son – my grandfather – embraced his ancestory and became a farmer / “opportunistic equitable business man” a/k/a con man. His children (6 boys, 2 girls) disowned their father due to his questionable and unsavory career choice and they all became honest hardworking citizens. A colorful ancestry sure makes for fun stories at family reunions!!

My bloodline begins with Ceallachain, the common ancestor of both the McCarthy’s and the O’Callaghan’s on my Mothers side.
Ceallachain assumes the Kingship of Munster (Ireland) about 937 A.D.
Ceallachain, King of Munster, who reigned from Cashel in Co. Tipperary died in 952 AD. The years following his death were riddled with killings and counter-killings as various factions fought for dominance. Eventually the McCarthy’s, also descendants of Ceallachain won supremacy and became the overlords of the O’Callaghan’s about 1120. After the Norman Conquest the MacCarthy (Dermot) submitted to the Anglo-Normans & alienated the allegiance of his sub-clans. Our clan held many castles in County Cork which only the ruins of only one stand today, Dromaneen. It lies south of the River Blackwater, between Lombardstown and Mallow. On the opposite (north) bank stands Longueville House, now a highly prestigious Hotel and Restaurant.
Forward 1800 years when my 4th Great Grand Mother came to Ohio and married another Irishman where they lived and eventually I came around. Moved to Texas in 1972 because of a steel strike that prevented me from going out on the oar boats running from Duluth to Cleveland. Here I became involved in drafting for the petrochemical industry and advanced from company to company. I’ve called Houston my homebase and have always returned after jobs as a miner, estimator, purchasing agent, jobsite supervisor, laborer or whatever else I needed to do to keep the money rolling.

My father’s side moved to North Carolina from Scotland in the 1600s. He ended up in a Houston hospital from a WWII war injury where he met my mother who was a nurse (so he never was a Texan). My mother’s folks (great-grandparents) moved to Taylor, Texas in the 1890s from Germany. They were school teachers & eventually ended up in San Antonio. They had 12 children so I have lots of relatives from that side.

The only “famous”(?) ancestor that I know of was a Supreme Court Justice in North Carolina.

On one side, my family has been in Texas since before Independence (I have ancestors who fought at Bexar and San Jacinto), and they got to Texas from Kentucky, Tennessee, and Missouri (and Virginia and North Carolina before that). But we’ve been in the US since before the Revolution, so even though the root is mostly English and Scottish, it hardly matters!
On the other side, it’s German and…. I’m not sure what. There’s a little Cherokee in there, and probably either French or British of some ilk. I don’t know as much about the genealogy on that side.

22 Years ago I traced my families The Bleifeld’s was from Germany with my Great grandfather coming to the Unites states in 1881 and winding up in Coal city Illinois as Coal miners then to Eastern Colorado as dry land farmers. Then to Georgetown as gold and silver miners. The Marvel’s Started out in England and arriving in this soon to be new nation around 1690 or 1700’s They arrived in Virginia then went across the mountains to Kentucky. Up until the 1930’s they worked as share croppers. in the 1930’s they went to Colorado. to be gold miners. Genealogical is a wonderful subject, and right her in Houston is the Clayton Library of genealogy that is a wonderful place to find your family

My dad came to Texas from Pennsylvania as part of his military service, back in the 50’s. He met my mom when she was singing at the Air Force Base one Saturday night at Ellington. They married and moved to Waco, then to Houston when he discharged. Dad worked at the Port of Houston all his life and I have many great stories about that..

Mom’s family has been in Texas since before it won it’s independence from Mexico. They were the Brinkmans and the Flynns, all from Bastrop. My great grandmother Annie learned she had a popular cousin (Erroll) and wrote him a letter once. He replied to her and that letter is still around, though I haven’t seen it lately. Of her five Irish brothers, 4 were drinking and fighting all the time and usually spent weekends in the county jail. She was greatly embarassed by the situation.

My mom’s dad’s family came from a farm in Jennings, Louisiana. My grandfather Lloyd survived a horrible car wreck in his twenties which broke his neck and nearly paralyzed him. He had joined the Joe Young Orchestra as a trombonist and (after his triple hernia) a drummer and they toured all around Texas and eventually became the house band for the Sons of Hermann until they all got too old. His wife was a freelance photographer covering Houston in the 40’s and 50’s. In her old darkroom are tons of images of Houston from back then. They’d make a nice book.

6th Generation native German Texan and roots very deep here in Austin County, TX. My g.g.g. grandfather on one Schneider side suggested the name Millheim for the little community they settled in after Muelheim in Germany. My great grandfather, Joachim Hintz, built among other buildings, the round dance halls in Cat Spring, Bellville and Peters. Earliest ancestors came while Texas was still a Republic, 1840 I believe. Schneider, Hintz, Hess, Schneider folks all came right here to Austin County. A cousin has several branches traced back to 1600’s and before back in the mother country.

So today is Texas Independence Day, March 2. God bless Texas and may all those heroes who made it possible RIP.

Judy I don’t know that much about my past except that I too have hill country German roots. I’m in Houston now but long to return to the hill country. I was born in Austin, had a great grandmother, Oma, who spoke fluent German and lived in San Marcos. I’d love to do an ancestry chart some day, to see how all this started.

The old folks sold their gris mill and left Moravia in the 1800s,
arrived in New Orleans and took an ox cart to Ammansville in Fayette county.
Once there they built a ranch and did a little farming too.
They are all still there buried next to that painted church.
I’ll end up there when the time comes.

Leon, Since you asked, my mother was a mixture of Polish/Alsatian/German born in Detroit, Michigan. My dad was mostly English and born in Newark, Ohio. All their folks came through New York’s Ellis Island, far as I know. I was born in Detroit and only too happy to have my parents move to Texas when I was eight. Call me a 72-year naturalized Southwesterner. One of my greatest blessings. My paternal grandmother checked our ancestry back to England for a time then abruptly dropped the subject. We all suspected she found a highwayman or other unseemly character in our lineage which warranted cessation of the project. My maternal grandparents both spoke German but all their kin were short, dark with brown eyes. Not a blue-eyed blonde in the crowd. Took several years before I understood they were Alsation/French whose country was occupied by Germany at the time. Grandfather had to modify his birth name to look germanic just to get a passport over here. Thankfully, he did. Then Senator Gerald Ford had to get a special bill passed to help him remain in the US during WWII because of that Germin-looking last name. But that’s another story.

Near as I can figure, Spanish and French originally. Our family came to Mexico with the Spaniards to raise and sell horses. We eventually settled in northern Mexico along the Rio Grande, just south of what is now San Elizario, Texas. All was well until Pancho Villa raided the ranch in 1912, stealing all the horses and driving my great grandparents into the US, where they lived in El Paso, TX. And there we pretty much stayed until my mom, brothers and sister moved to california and I came out here to Houston. Both my grandfathers and one of my grandmothers were Mexican citizens at one time. My dad’s mom was born in Las Cruces, NM.

We even have a coat of arms. With a frog (of all things!) on it. I have no idea where that came from and no one is left who could explain it.

Prussian Captain took offense at something his superior officer did.
Sometime in the late 1700’s.
Challenged him to a duel.
Won.
Suddenly the United States looked a whole lot better than Prussia.
Other side:
from England, we think. Around the same time.
Started in Virginia.
Kept moving west until they found heaven.
So they settled in East Texas.

I am a fifth generation Texan. That is how I got here, that is where I came from!! LOL

On pops’ side, German, all the way back to two brothers and a wife that immigrated through the Port of Galveston in 1854. Another relative that spoke German went there (Germany) in ’71 and took the tree back to the mid 1600’s. Mostly farmers, ranchers and blacksmiths (several). Kind of funny, because the literal translation of our last name, in German, more or less means “maker of hacking tools…Hackemack!.

Moms’ side is kinda clouded. Immigrated to Texas some time, in a covered wagon from Georgia. I think genetically…mostly English. One of my G grandmothers was pure Cherokee. Something Bear? Running Bare? Squatting Bear? Something like that…..seriously!! LOL We have a pic of her and I could call an Aunt to find out what her real “bear” name was. Ya think I could open a casino?

When my children began their studies of Texas history, I took the opportunity to do a little digging into the past. Seems that Stephan F. Austin brought families, a second set old 300, from Alabama. My family began in what is now the Navasota, Waller, White Hall, area. My grandmother was born on “the old Beatty place”in Texas in 1888. This was my mom’s family. My Dad’s family came to the United States with the Quakers and migrated to Texas and settled in Crockett. We are Texas Born, Texas Raised, and very proud of it!

Its been a day of remembrance here, got a book with all my old faternal friends names and addresses, both those who passed and those still living. Then read your column and started the remembrance in earnest. My family were all farmers in Iowa. great greats came from Indiana and Kentucky, I think they farmed there as well, English, Irish, French and German from what I was told. Don’t know when they came acrosse the pond but must have…

Thorena’s mama is descended from 5 Indian women
that hid in a store room during a battle with de Soto.
One of de Soto’s cavaliers found them in an upper
store room. They rushed him and seized him by 5
appendages, and beat on him and bit on him and
likely would have killed him, if his friends had not
arrived and driven them off.

She tried the same thing
with Thorena’s daddy lots of times, until she wore
him out, and got a new sparing partner. That new man
didn’t last 3 years, so I am pretty sure this
is true. The paper trail is faint, but
the blood trail is easy to follow.

Very good thread Mr Hale. Thank you.
My mothers side was Irish. Later we found out that in th 1730’s a Scot moved to Ireland and we come from that. My mothers grandmother came over on a coffin ship, 3 or 5 of her children died during the voyage and went over the side. My great grand father was President of the Bronx before it was part of NYC.
My fathers side doesn’t have much info. My both grand parents came over from the Ukraine. He died when my Dad was 12. They ran a bar in upstate NY, grocery store during prohibition and then back to a bar. My Dad was running it when he met my Mom after WWII. Found a 1910,20 handwritten census records that have their nationality as Austrian-Hungrian. Guess the Ukraine was part of the empire back then. Seems like a long time ago but really wasn’t.

My ancestors were French Huguenots – which simply means they were protestant, and were protected from the Catholic Church in France by the Edict of Nantes. Somehow my ancestor correctly predicted the Edict would be revoked, so he took his family and possessions and moved to England, along with a large group of Huguenots. All would likely have been killed had they stayed in France. They lived in England a few years and then came to the Carolinas in 1686. The family grew and prospered as successful planters for many generations until the civil war.
My great grandfather was given a slave and a fine horse by his father when he joined the Confederate army. I suppose his fine horse got him the job of being a courier for J.E.B. Stuart.
At wars end my great grandfather was a bitter man and refused to take the oath of allegiance. Instead, he took his wife and baby (my grandfather), and left the USA. He was employed as an engineer by a company that was building a railroad across South America. My grandfather was 5 years old when they returned to live in Texas, and he spoke only Portuguese. When he was an old man he told me that he couldn’t remember a single word of Portuguese.
In Texas my great grandfather went to work as an engineer for a company that had a contract to clear some rivers in East Texas. Steamboats were going all the way to Jefferson, but Texas wanted the logs and snags cleared out. After clearing the rivers the water ran faster, the water level dropped and the rivers were no longer navigable by steamboat. So much for foresight and planning.
My great grandfather settled his family in the little East Texas town of San Augustine. My grandfather grew up there, married and that is where my father was born and raised.
My father moved to far West Texas around 1924. He opened a lumber yard in Littlefield, a few miles west of Lubbock, and that’s where I was born and raised. I’m retired now and live in Amarillo.
About the only thing French in our family now is the name.

GeoP, Dad bought a farm north of Whitharral in 1940 where I was raised. I was in Littlefield regularly (paved road from farm to Littlefield, not our Hockley county seat of Levelland). Dad had three brothers who bought Lamb country farms around Littlefield in the 30’s. I suspect all of them bought lumber for their various building projects from your Dad.

Both sides of my family came mainly from England, Ireland and Scotland. History of how they got to Texas is sketchy but there were stops in Virginia, Georgia, Tennessee, and Alabama for some of them.
My paternal great grandfather was discharged from the Confederate army in Alabama, being awarded his horse and sidearm. He went to Panola County, Texas with two of his brothers and they farmed. My grandfather and my father were raised there, but my father and his five brothers left the farm and only “gardened” thereafter.
My Mother’s history is similar: several generations of farmers in Panola county.
I was raised in San Augustine and have lived in a number of places, some quite far from home. I’ve ended up in NW Louisiana only about five miles from Texas. We haven’t decided whether we’ll be “moving home” to Texas or not but we’re mighty close!

@John Marshall, My family is also from Panola Cty and Shelby Cty. I was born and raised in Houston just because Daddy needed to come to the city to work in the early 50’s. Some of my best memories were “born” in East Texas. Daddy’s side were Milfords and Wedgeworths (settled in Shelby) on Mother’s side we had Adams and Heatons (Panola)

This subject fascinates me and I’ve spent many long hours delving into my Texas family’s past at the Heritage Center in LaGrange. Typical to the Texas Hill County, my paternal grandmother was third generation German; my grandfather of Scoth-Irish descent. My parents met & married during WWII and Mom left her home in Rhode Island to marry a Texan. Thanks to the research that my New England uncle, Mom’s brother did, I know that my multiple-great grandmother came to the New World on the good ship Planter from Kinston-on-Thames, England in 1635, and that one of those g-grandmother’s married a Narragansett Indian, and that my grandmother’s line goes back to Benedict Arnold. But don’t hold that against me:)

I’ve always found it amusing that the popularity of claiming American Indian ancestry ebbs and flows. It peaked after the release of the movie “Dances with Wolves”. Most claims seems to be connected to an Indian Princess who was the daughter of a chief. Tracing one’s ancestry to an American Indian man is rare. Anybody know the reason why?

When I was a kid in Houston, calling someone an indian was worse than being called a mexican, nevermind calling someone black! As you say, the tide changes and EVERYONE wants to be part American indian!

Red, it’s a cultural thing. In the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and even into the Twentieth Centuries, a great deal more stigma attached to the white woman who took up with an Indian man than to the white man who took a squaw. Cynthia Ann Parker led a much more miserable life after she was forced to return to the white man’s world than she led with the Comanches.

I asked my friend Bubba about his heritage, and after having to explain to him what that word means, he told me he was half Big Thicket, a fourth Bayou Teche and a fourth Tonkawa (without specifying which fourth was Tonkawa).

English, Scots-Irish, German, and ancestry traced back to Pocahontas. Other members of the family have traced even further but I think mostly into the English ancestry before immigration to America. My great grandmothers family immigrated from Germany, ended up in Tennessee, and thence to Oklahoma. I call myself a real mixture of American ancestry.

I am mostly German, with Danish & French. I have no idea where in those countries the ancestors came from, or why they left. I do know that some could speak “Low German”, whatever that is. The first ancestor to the new world came because the King of Spain granted him some land somewhere in Texas. He first went to New Orleans. He came to Texas after Mexico won their independence. On mom’s side, the first came through Galveston (I assume) and went to San Felipe & eventually to Washington, Co. He arrived just before or after the Texas Revolution, I think after. One of Dad’s grandfathers came in 1873 about the same time Mom’s father arrived. The closest thing to a claim to fame is that someone by our name was the 1st person electrocuted in an electric chair. (There aren’t many of us, so he my be kin.)
My wife’s family could supply enough movie material to keep Hollywood busy for years. About half were killers & other no-accounts. Thankfully about half were good folks. She is mostly Scotch-Irish, French and Native American with a tiny bit of German. The genes of 4 tribes runs in her veins (Comanche, Apache, Cherokee, & Creek (I think). Her mom could have starred in movies as the best looking squaw you ever saw. But, my wife is a natural blonde. Her only native American feature is her very dark eyes. Go figure.

Supposedly the first time the family name appears in history was in a french form as a soldier/follower of William the Conquerer in the Norman invasion of 1066. So apparently some Englishman carried the name to America. I don’t think any history has been established per se, just a few oral traditions. One is of three brothers in England, two either decided to come to America or were strongly encouraged (two stories), the third eloped with some Lord’s daughter and fled to America. The story gets lost after that, but the lineage come orally comes from one of those brothers. The name appears in Georgia as an early Governor in the late 1700’s, and a county is named after him.

My Granddad migrated from Georgia to Texas in about 1900 along with a couple of brothers, some uncles and cousins. My paternal grandmother was said to be “Black Dutch” (whatever that means), she was small and dark complexioned. They neither ever saw their parents again after leaving Georgia. In his 80’s, Granddad was taken back by a grandson (my cousin) in the late 60’s. As I said before, when they approached Georgia he asked my cousin if he thought “they might still be looking for him”. My cousin didn’t pursue that conversation.

On my Mother’s side; Irish, English and Scotch ancestors. Back a few GGG’s-dads ago, James O’Barry or Barry was a part of the American Revolution and owned land around Washington, DC. He was Ambassador to Portugal when he died in 1804, leaving behind a will and naming some revolutionary heros as executors of his “vast holdings”. His “fortune” wound up basically being some oil paintings worth a little but appareently not enough to pay his debts. His son is supposed to have migrated to Texas and is thought to have been a physician. Mom’s grandfather Barry owned a community store and was a druggist (before pharmacists) in Kopperl, Texas in the 1880’s and her Dad was a farmer in Young County.

I’m a third generation borned in Texas. Previous generations came mainly from Tennessee with some South Carolina and Georgia influence. Had a great, great, great, great grandfather die at the Alamo and a great, great grandfather fight at San Jacinto. I guess I get to stay in Texas.

In the late Sixties on a date lost to my memory, I saw the earth from the moon for the first time, most of civilized humanity saw it with me, what I saw was the end of all life on this planet, most of mankind saw it with me , but with a more optimistic perspective they saw what they wanted to see, I suppose I did as well!
Recently In the National Geographic magazine I read that the earth had just reached the milestone of seven billion human habitants ,It has been a common myth that more humans live on the surface of the earth today than have ever been born throughout all time, A famous mathematician said “Poppycock!”If you do the math and add up backwards from today for fifty thousand years the population is many hundreds of more times larger than our current population!
Another brilliant fella said add up your relatives counting backward for twenty generation, and you’d be surprised to find out just how many people it took to get you here, you have two donors one female one male that were necessary to create you, each one of them had two donors as well and so on and so on, that number (drum roll please)1,048,576.Let me spell that out, One million Forty eight thousand, Five hundred and seventy six, relatives it took to make the one you! That’s in just twenty generation, to me a generation is from birth till reproduction so at yesterdays rate about every fourteen years is a new generation. That’s around three hundred years raise that age to today’s standard of eighteen years and that same time is about four hundred years.
Now what was the question ? Where are you from?
I’m from the planet earth, a species called Human, I was born on the north American continent in the western hemisphere, all those things are meaningless if I draw a imaginary boundaries and divide myself from my fellow humans by religion, by color, by political ideology, Or any of the other non important things we kill one another for.
In the late Sixties on a date lost to my memory, I saw the earth from the moon for the first time, most of civilized humanity saw it with me, what I saw was the end of all life on this planet, most of mankind saw it with me, but with a more optimistic perspective they saw what they wanted to see, I suppose I did as well.
In 1974 the American Eugenics project was ended by presidential decree it was way over due .I saw a PBS program that explained how the Nazis had emulated our eugenics program and in their brilliant fashion took it to its final conclusion, the annihilation of the ethnically impure, mankind had reach a new high in science, for death became us!
I feel weak, impotent, unable to change injustice, unable to protect my values, Unable to accept death! I share this with a lot of folks ,most wont admit it. They’re taught they have a all powerful god that will cure death, bring eternal justice , and empowers them to super natural heights, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, They wait patiently or they act out empowered by their belief in a all powerful god never mind their god is all powerful and doesn’t need them to do anything, never mind their gods have given them eternity to get retributive action, they blow up entire cities, they destroy entire nation, they divide the spoils, and praise god for their victory over the other gods.
I wonder if it could talk what it would say about those believers killing their fellow man for some weak impotent god that can’t act for it’s own self. Look at the omni verse at all those stars all those galaxies, surely if we were created we were just a after thought, A accident of creation
an unimportant species on the outer edge of a unimportant galaxies among many billion of species that exist on all those planets around all those stars( nope I cant see a atom either but I know we have atomic weapons) Just how important are we?
I say self important only!
So what was the question ,Where are you from?
I’m from a place that someday will surely be destroyed by folks that can’t accept we are all there is!
I’m from a place where far to few people realize they’re just a few generation removed from that starving bloated baby with the fly covered face in some other part of the world, that they’re related to that child ,it doesn’t matter what color their skin , how tall they are or what side of the sports contest or political divide they place themselves on. It doesn’t matter what gods they worship or don’t worship it doesn’t matter what imaginary line they draw for themselves, That sick cripple , that pregnant single woman, that prostitute with aids or her lonely customer, that’s yours and mine kinfolks.
We are killing one another, for what?
In the late Sixties on a date lost to my memory, I saw the earth from the moon for the first time, most of civilized humanity saw it with me, what I saw was the end of all life on this planet, most of mankind saw it with me , but with a more optimistic perspective they saw what they wanted to see, I suppose I did as well!
I’m a human being from A planet called earth, sometimes I’m ashamed to admit it.
One world One species , Maybe a better question would be why do we have nationalism?
Why wont people accept their own mortality? Why do we Tolerate injustice?

Take a dead rat and tie its tail to a ten and a half foot long piece of string and go to the center of First Colony Mall at high noon on any Saturday in December and start swinging that rat round and round, and I expect that about one out of every three people you hit with that rat will have one or more common ancestors with you in that 20 generations, and if you extend that number of generations far enough back, every person you hit will have a common ancestor with you, whether her name be Lucy or Eve.

I used to have thoughts like that…usually lying on the floor on my back, staring at a circle of light on the ceiling (i before…never mind..IT WORKED!!! LOL)from an oil lamp, and a couple of roaches in an ashtray! LOL Maybe an empty gin bottle.

Nothing wrong with deep thoughts!! Ya, know…like, first there was nothing, then there was something, then it blew up, and presto changeo….THERE WAS EVERYTHING!! LOL

As I’ve mentioned before, my grandfather, an American with a spanish surname, had a ranch/farm(?) somewhwere between Marfa and Alpine, the trail, as the family knows it, begins there. All Grampaws cattle died, this was told to me by my Dad and later my Dad and his bro got into some trouble and hightailed it to New Mexico. There they heard about the railroad job in Oklahoma, and went to work there. When the RR was done, they both settled there and that’s where I was born. As I understand it, neither could speak english but picked it up as they went along. The RR they helped build was to the packing plants in OKC, Wilson & Co. and Armor. He was the Star pitcher for the Wilson & Co. baseball team, but that’s another story.

Quick switcheroo…went to visit my shut in friend at Marble Falls and after the visit, went eagle watching. Between the eagles home and Llano( had to get some Coopers BBQ) I passed a plot of beautiful, nice and tall blue bonnets….so the seasons on the way and if those guys were an example of whats to come, it should be a very pretty spring.

Tommy, yeah, you can stay in Texas but maybe you need to recalibrate those greats; both those battles were fought in the spring of 1836. The anniversary of the fall of the Alamo is in a few days.
After Thought : Tommy you have 32 great great great great grandpaws, which one died in the Alamo ?

RED: I always ask my wife why she and most folks with Native American blood freely mention the Cherokee bloodlines but seldom mention those that history describes as ‘savage tribes’. Of course, none of the tribes were more savage than the ‘white man’. I always rooted for the Indians on TV or at the movies. If I watched a rerun, I always hoped th Indians would ‘get it right’ this time.

My Mother was Scottish,from a family of two sisters and a brother born in Edinburgh. Mother enlisted in the Womens’ Royal Navy (“WRENS”)in WWII and met my dad (Officer in US Navy) in Southampton just before he went across the pond to Normandy on D-day. My Dad’s side was German on both parents side. My Grandmother’s German ancestors were two brothers who immigrated in the early 1770’s and fought in the Revolutionary War (on the winning side of course!). We can track everyone since then down to the present. My Granddad’s German roots are a little vague since his dad (my Great Grandfather) was somewhat of a mystery man and little is known about him other than that his parents were both German. My Great Grandmother died after giving birth to my Grandfather and all we know about her is that she was Dutch. My wife’s ancestors were also German. They came over through Ellis Island in 1912, just after the Titanic sank. Legend is they were supposed to have been on the Titanic, but their ship from Germany was late in arriving in Southampton and they missed the sailing and had to catch a later ship. We know the ship they came on arrived in NY 8 days after the Titanic sank, so maybe there is some truth to the legend.

My dad’s family, the Millers, were among the Sassenach’s settled in Northern Ireland in the 1600s, for some reason one came to Pennsylvania in the 1730s. His descendants went into KY to explore and settle in the late 1700s, and further descendants went into MO in the early 1800s where they met up and married into the Rices, originally from Wales, and the Conklins, originally from NY and before that from Holland. From there to OK, then TX in 1939. My mother’s family were in VA in the mid 1600s, then into TN in the early 1800s. The Jernigans picked up Scots from McAdams and English from Blakes and Loves, and Austrian from Pheiffers, eventually came to TX in late 1800s, then to OK where my mom married my dad. My mom and I were both born in TX. And along the way there’s supposed to be Cherokee and Powhaten, but those connections have not been verified. I’m truly a result of the melting pot.

Very interesting reading, so my entry may be tame by comparison.
An inhabitant of Texas, via British Airways, since 1988. Family History was a major interest for many decades on a wordwide basis and started because my wife was intrigued by my uncommon surname when we first married. We traced my paternal roots son to father by personal access to original sources to 1541, where we ran out of written records for what had been mostly lowly working people in the agricultural counties of Cornwall and Devonshire in Western England. The hobby led us into researching the surname on a worldwide basis, but most of these voluminous files have now been passed to a researcher in England with the same last name, who is continuing where we left off.
Metherell came from Old English for “Middle Hill” and the earliest record we discovered was a deed giving land to Thomas de Mederhelle in 1287, although not a provable relation. This land was being spelt in the current way within 300 years. It was normal in England many centuries ago to have a first name followed by “of” (“de”) the place where they were born, or lived, so Thomas de Mederhelle of the thirteenth century is the equivalent to Thomas Metherell today.
One of the joys of our hobby was meeting people in several countries who invited us into their homes and families and who were as fascinated by what we could tell them about their ancestry as we were to talk with them. Clicking on Ancestry.com doesn’t have the magic of such moments, albeit much easier than laboriously reading an manuscript that has sat in a Parish Chest for hundreds of years, or scraping the moss off ancient stones in an abandoned graveyard.

I’m half POlish from dad’s side and half German on mom’s side. Dad and his siblings would speak Polish (just so we couldn’t understand them), but were born in Texas, not sure which ancestor came here. Maternal grandmother was required to speak German at home or suffer the consequences and mom remembers the “high tea” at 4:00 pm tradition when she was young. Not sure when that side arrived in America, but mom was a proud member of DAR so it must have been a long time ago. Sure glad they settled in Texas!

What fun comments to read. It’s interesting how we all have an endless number of family lines but only a handful that stick with us.

My family on both sides is mainly English with a smidgen of German mixed in somewhere along the line. My mother’s family came to Texas with Stephen F. Austin. Dad’s side pioneered west to California in wagons, but Dad said one day he looked around and saw the fruits to one side and the nuts to the other and got to Texas as fast as he could – lucky for me.

Jack in A mentioned Ellis Island. Went to New York maybe a year after 9/11 to witness what the jerks of the world had done. Took a trip to Ellis Island and did a search for SWMBOs Austrian grand parents and there they were. Came in with what they owned plus twelve dollars if memory serves. A very touching moment and many tears were shed. She made copies for her two sisters and herself, family treasures. Lady Liberty was still closed to visitors, but the view of her was still terrific.

Red, I have Native American ancestors. My extended family was interested in that for two primary reasons. The first was money. The federal government recognizes more than 500 tribes. Members of a federally recognized tribe are eligible for some benefits. Status as a “Minority” has the potential to open many federal vault doors. The Bureau of Indian Affairs offers benefits. The tribes themselves, among others, offer benefits like low-interest loans and college grants or scholarships.

The other reason was simply romantic. It’s different. It might be a cool thing to be descended from Dances with Wolves and Stands with a Fist. The reality in my case is that I am descended from Poor as Church Mouse and Boot Standing on Head. Dead by 1830, their lives were, “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short,” to borrow Thomas Hobbes’ phrase from Leviathan. They were victims of the war for survival. So what else is new?

The Indian Wars. Indian bad, white man good. The Indian Wars came along for a few decades, and effectively ended with the Battle of the Little Big Horn in 1876. With the passage of time, the memory of conflict with the Indians faded. By 1970, Hollywood had begun to portray white men as evil and American Indians as Noble Savages; peaceful, earth-loving nomads who would not hurt a fly unless unduly provoked, like the Indians in Little Big Man, and Dances with Wolves.

The Noble Savage is a natural man that one can find in literature over the last 500 years. He embodies the notion that humans in their natural state are inherently good and moral creatures. But distinguish Native Americans from the members of the native tribes found today in Afghanistan. We invaded both, on their home ground.

Yet, we will not soon see a Hollywood production with an actor like the lovable and benign Chief Dan George portraying an Afghan warlord. We are currently at war with some Afghan tribes, and they are killing U. S. soldiers and Marines today. White men no longer battle American Indians. Custer and his U. S. soldiers died 135 years ago.

So, why does the popularity of claiming American Indian ancestry ebb and flow? Well, who among us would not wish to be descended from an inherently good Noble Savage? Especially the Chief, or his daughter….

Kevin: My wife’s great ot great great grandfather was captured & raised as an Apache. One year following his capture he was returned, to where his folks lived. That night he saw his mother washing dished by candlelight. He was told he could go back if he choose. He did not want to return. That reaction was quite common for children held 3 months or longer. When about 17 or 18, he killed the ‘medicine man’ & had to run for his life. Rather then going back to what we would call civilization, he hid out in Palo Duro Canyon until he got the nerve to walk into the Comanche camp. (They and the Apaches were bitter enemies.) He bacame Quanah’s trusted friend and led raids throughout Texas, including one in which my great grandmother’s first husband was killed. (She was my GGF’s 3rd wife and not a blood relative, but the only GGM I knew.) My wife and I met in Houston when I was 25 & she was 23. Her ancestors & mine come from different parts of Texas. It is a small world,

PHLarry You and I could trade a lot of stories about main street in Littlefield in the 1940’s, jammed with cars and people on Saturday nights, and the Palace, Ritz and Rio theaters. I would love to tell you about Dr. Whit Harral, for whom Whitharral is named. Dr. Harrell bought lumber from my dad on numerous occasions and dad had colorful stories about him and his chauffeur.

GeoP, email me at luboz@yahoo.com and we’ll get together for coffee some AM. I never knew Whit Harral (was his full name Whitfield? that is what I’ve understood all these years). Look forward to meeting you.

Interesting that so few responders mention the Czech/Polish/Moravian lineage prevalent in the south central corridor of the state. As for me, maternal Grandfather born in Prague, Czech. immigrated to US and at some point met and married my Grandmother who was born in Iowa. They settled in Karnes Co. (in and around Kenedy)and produced 10 little Pustejovskys. Paternally, my Grandfather (Skrehot) was born in Spalov, Czech. (between Olomouc and Ostrava) came to Texas and settled around Yoakum. My wife, a Jones from NW Florida and now deceased, did tons of genealogical research and found that one of her relatives (Mial Scurlock) died at the Alamo. Mial’s brother William was at Goliad and either he or another relative was spared in the massacre because of his medical training. This Scurlock line can be tied to the Scurlock Tower in Houston’s medical complex. Another of the wife’s people was instrumental in founding the oldest Protestant Church in Texas (McMahan’s Chapel near Milam, Tx.). Genealogy is almost like a dog chasing his tail….round and round we go and find it’s hard to stop. This is my first time to post on Hale’s blog…hope I didn’t mess up or step on any toes.

Don in Lufkin: Now that you mention it, I wonder why we have not heard from many of Czech heritage as well. There are so many Czechs in Texas. My late father greatly admired the Polish farmers around Chappel Hill. They were hard working, thrifty, and constantly accumulating real estate, be it raw land, or rental property. He would likely say they are too busy looking after their real estate (or looking for more to buy) to spend time on a blog.

Ok seriously?
A while back, some body wrote a book the founding families of Nachogdoches,it pretty much tells my fathers family story in Texas, now thats if you just go by the males blood line, take it back a notch they came from louisianna after being prosecuted and deported from Toulon France
for practicin jewery, they can be traced back to the knight templars and had a standing order, till acusssed of witchcraft and imprisoned before that the seamans records indicate croatia and before that greece,the written trail stops there.
On my mammies side going only by the females cant go back any further then the late nineteenth century ,great granmas momma migrated to texas with her husband he was english,great grandma married a english fella, her daughter married a irish man and then my mammie was born.

Paternal Great Grandfather immigrated from Kassel, Germany in 1858. He bought a 1600 acre farm near Dublin. He traded it for a farm in Huntington, Texas in 1874. He had 11 children. Family history says he would not allow his children to speak German at home. They were required to speak English. Maternal Grandfather moved to Texas from SE US in the early 1900’s. He drove a truck to work in the oil fields and the rest of his family came later by mule-drawn wagon.

My father was fond of calling us “scotch eyes deutsch’. We are of Scottish-Irish background on my mother’s side. My paternal great grands were Buskes from Germany. Somewhere in my father’s family was also a Stephens in the confederate government.

Born / raised in NE Oklahoma (Will Rogers Country) Tulsa / Claremore. Indian names and tribes were part of Oklahoma history. English German grandparents on mother’s side with Irish American on Dad’s side.Mother’s dad was
in the ‘OKLAHOMA LAND RUSH’ where ‘sooner’ name was given to those who crossed the state
line to ‘stake out homesteads’ ahead of the
appointed ‘time-place’ to enter the event.HE also had the first ‘milk cow Dairy’ in Tulsa.
My father was in OKLA Oil Field construction
work (large round oil storage tanks). My wife and I said ‘WE DO” in Tulsa (1947) and moved to Houston in 1949 with Humble Oil Co (Polk
and Main).We will be married 65 years in August. As Leon has mentioned a few times WE HAVE SEEN HOUSTON from the git-go.

Welsh to Virginia in 1658. One of his boys, who’s wife was PA dutch, recieved landin South Carolina for service in the VA continental line. He also recieved 100 pounds of tobbacco. From South Carolina to Mississippi in the 1820’s. From Mississippi to Louisiana in the 1840’s. From Louisiana to Texas in 1854. Been here ever since. This is my paternal line. The outcrossings after the first have all been Scotch Irish as far as I can know.

There were two branches to the family name that came to Virginia in the Mid 1600s. One rich and famous and the other not. Guess which side my family was. Where my family starts in America the originator of the family name was either a nephew or the bastard of the rich and famous guy. I’d have to go back across the waters to find out which and have never been that interested. I do know that the first guys’ uncle was deported from England to Barbados for high treason what ever that might have been.

No famous folk in this family….. Cousin Roy went to war as a private in the Army air Corp., went to bobardier school and retired as a Brigadier Gen. from the U.S. Air force. Watta guy!
Back in those days, it WAS possible.

Wildflower report: Lots of yellow & light violet flowers, plus wild plums in central Texas. There were a lot of great looking flowers on SH 304 S of Bastrop & N off FM 2571. Flowers were about as large as a half dollar, pink purple & yellow. A few Bluebonnets starting to bloom on I10 in the Columbus Schulenburg area. E of Sealy, there were a lot of blooming huische.

Scots, Irish, English on my dads side. English on my mothers. Both sides came to Texas from Virginia, I believe shortly before the tussle with Santa Ana. Just received a bunch of material from a brother which may clear up a time they immigrated to America. A LOT to cover though.

A few years before my slightly older cousin passed away, she started a genealogy (by blood test!) study of our family. From this I read that from my mother’s side, we came from the Hague, landed somewhere in Virginia, and apparently some went on to Florida to help establish the Pentecostals. This probably explains all the preachers in the family and the long history of benevolence and volunteerism. No clue as to why they traveled to Tennessee (my birth place), nor why they’ve been there so long. We do have a cemetery in west Tennessee where many of our long ago (and some not so long ago) relatives are buried. Some from the Civil War, WWI, and WWII. (This I remember from long ago.) From my brother’s genealogy study of our father’s side of the family, we came from Scotland. I didn’t receive a written report but rather was told this by my brother. I don’t seem to be of royal stock or even notoriety. Drat! I really think it’s not where you come from that makes a hill of beans but rather where you are headed. Smile.

Family names include Evans, Ware, Bledsoe, Russell and Kincheloe. All Welsh, Irish and/or English. Don’t know how or when the first ones came here. I have a lot of history of the Ware family. GGG grandfather was a gunsmith and was said to have made them for Washington’s army. GG grandfather was born in Kentucky and brought his family to Texas in 1830, living in what is now Kaufman County and later around what is now Willis, Texas. He organized a company to fight at the Siege of Bexar, then lead the company to fight at San Jacinto. He moved his family to the Sabinal valley in 1850, being the first white family to settle there. More families followed and the settlement was named Waresville, later changed to Utopia. The log cabin that he and his sons built has been preserved and still stands by the Sabinal River in Old Waresville. His tombstone is a Texas Historical Marker in Old Waresville Cemetary. I have rambled enough. Thanks.

In Dad’s family, the story has been handed down that the Texas revolution came about because of troublemakers from the states (They called them fillibusters) who came here w/o an invitation or the proper papers and just did what they wanted. They came because they were in trouble back home. Many were drunks, most were worse. They caused trouble for everyone, the Mexican government & the people who had settled here, especially Austin’s folks. As often happens, the government, Santa Ana, overreacted and the people then turned aganist him. Not very romantic, but Dad was told that story all his life by some oldtimers in the family.

I’m about 30% German, 60% English, and 10% other (Swiss, French, Scottish, Irish). All the German and Swiss branches came over between 1848 and 1858, supposedly to prevent the men from being drafted into the Kaiser’s army. One branch (Haubold/Pille/Grob) came to TX in 1848/9 and settled in New Ulm, later moving to Waco. The other German branch settled in the upper Midwest and gradually made it’s way down to southern Kansas. The rest of the ancestors came over before 1760, as far as I can tell.

When I was about 6 years old, my Mom took me to visit my grandfather in Austin, Texas. My grandfather took me to a small country store nearby, and when I walked into the store he told the white man behind the counter, that
“Este es el”, which means this is him. The man raised the door of the counter and came and hugged me. I was surprised and confused, wondering why is this white man hugging me? Turned out he was my real grandfather,on my father’s side. I need to do a study to find out who I really am.

I’m a relative new Texan (3rd generation) with both sides of my family coming here from Kansas via Oklahoma. I descend from Scots/Irish (apparently these ancestors spent a good deal of time going back and forth across the channel between Scotia and Airlann one step ahead of the local constabulary) and on back through Anglo-Saxon, French and Norwegian ancestors. My mother’s family had quite a few “upper crust” connections back to the 1400s. My father’s family, not so much, but they married well
Born in Wichita Falls in 1944, was moved to Houston when I was ~ 1yr.and grew up in Pecos (5 – 12yrs.) and back to Houston (1956 – now) Had a good, fun childhood in Pecos. Although not from a ranching background (Dad worked for Anderson, Clayton & Co.), I got a solid West Texas cowboy grounding as a child and met many characters that could have stepped out of an Elmer Kelton novel.

I’m a quite recent arrival: I’m Australian, but have lived in Texas for over 30 years. The company I worked for moved me to their head office here in 1978. That company died in 1985. My ancestry is English: my father’s ancestors moved to Australia from the Isle of Wight around 1870, my mother’s moved to Australia from England 30-40 years earlier.

On the other hand, my wife is a native Texan, eighth generation. Her father’s family settled in the Carthage area, probably over 150 years ago (they weren’t good at keeping records: her father only got a birth certificate after he joined the U.S. Navy during World War 2); her mother’s ancestors were in Texas, near Cleveland, when it was part of Mexico, moving there from Florida in a hurry after some trouble, something about someone being killed.

Ralph, and don’t forget the Vegemite… powerful stuff if you can swallow it without gagging.

It seems that many of us know something about our ancestor’s arrival in the US, and some know everything since. But many of us are like LesD’s in-laws, without a lot of written records. I don’t think my Dad ever had a birth certificate and missed so much school on the family farm during the depression that he finally quit school when he was sixteen or so.

I’m sure during the post-colonial days and Civil War years many of our forebears were too consumed with trying to make a living or stay alive to worry about keeping things like family records with the exception of a family Bible recording birth, marriage and death dates. Most of us would consider our lives too mundane to keep the type of records that would fill in the blanks 200 years from now that most of us are missing today.

The Civil War could also account for a lot of records being lost or destroyed in families from the south. And, when you move from Georgia (etc.) to Texas in a wagon, you probably don’t take a lot of non-essentials with you. So whatever records existed were possibly abandoned. Now we are left with sketchly oral accounts as best as they could be remembered years later.

I join others in welcoming several new commentors to the blog. Enjoyed your posts.

PHL: Vegemite: We have owned two homes. In both, we had aneighbor who actually atet that stuff!! But the one from Australia brings me back Red Tulip chocolates & a box of Blue Roo every time she returns!

I feel pretty sure that most, if not all, of our ancestors came here because things back home weren’t so great. And, im my case, I think that is why they never talked much or knew much about their ancestors or where they came from.

All four of my dad’s grandparents emigrated from Sweden to Kittson County Minnesota (northwest corner of the state) in the 1860’s; I still go deer hunting up there occasionally. My mom was a typical American mutt….English/Scottish etc….named Smith and was raised a Moravian…..

Hmm it appears like your website ate my first comment (it was super long) so I guess I’ll just sum it up what I had written and say, I’m thoroughly enjoying your blog. I as well am an aspiring blog blogger but I’m still new to everything. Do you have any points for novice blog writers? I’d certainly appreciate it.